


Brothers in Arms

by a_la_grecque



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-29
Updated: 2013-06-29
Packaged: 2017-12-16 12:23:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/861999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_la_grecque/pseuds/a_la_grecque
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tyrion has some time to reminisce as he is locked in the Black Cells in Kings Landing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Brothers in Arms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alley_Skywalker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alley_Skywalker/gifts).



> I hope this is an acceptable gift for you alley_skywalker, it did end up a little darker than I had anticipated! Thank you for the great prompt, it was a good challenge trying to get inside the heads of the Lannister boys.
> 
> Possible spoilers through to AFFC.

Down in the dark, Tyrion remembers.

Endless hours it seems, stretching out before him and it seems inevitable that some of them will be filled by visiting the past. He knows, of course, a little of what is happening in the world that continues on around him, he is far too canny to escape that. He knows that Jaime has returned… and how.

At times, he amuses himself by thinking about the crippling irony of it all. In the darkest moments, he thinks that Jaime is actually there with him.

_Now who’s half a man?_

Of course it’s always Jaime who has been half a man. Tyrion knows he’s never really been whole. Jaime and Cersei managed to hide it from most; but left with little to do but watch and listen and learn in Casterly Rock, Tyrion has known for as long as he can remember that they complete each other.

It’s been useful knowledge to have, through the years. But useful doesn’t make it easy to live with, or pleasant to have.

It’s strange for Tyrion to think of all the twists and turns that led him to seek knowledge in this way. Growing up at Casterly Rock had been hard for all of them. _The Lannister way_ , as Tywin always had it, growing up in a lion’s den where only the strong survived. Tyrion knew that wasn’t true, he only had to look at his uncles to understand that what Tywin had done to his children was something entirely of his own making.

Tyrion tries to draw comfort, at times, from the fact that Tywin’s experiment had been an abject failure, they all had their weaknesses – Tyrion his twisted body, Cersei her sex, and Jaime… for a long time Tyrion had thought that Jaime’s weakness was their sweet sister, a perfect hero corrupted by an evil witch. It had been a long and bitter road for him to walk to recognise that wasn’t true, Jaime’s weakness was simply that he was shrank away from complex responsibilities.

Even in their younger days, Jaime’s desires had been simpler than those of his siblings, and Tyrion and Cersei had long been engaged in a battle to win his affections. Jaime’s solution had been to get himself sent away as soon as possible and leave them to it, without ever seeming to understand what was at stake.

It had been hard going for Tyrion without Jaime there, his older brother had always helped to temper his sister’s cruelty. As he grew older, Tyrion wondered if Cersei’s hatred had been so vehement because she was terrified of being forced into being a mother to him, shunted into what she seemed to feel was an insignificant role. _Perhaps it was just as well_ , Tyrion thought bitterly, _Joffrey surely served as an example that it was better to have no mother at all than to have her._

Still, as a boy, all he’d been conscious of was the hurt – tormented by his sister and despised by his father, Jaime had been his only comfort. Jaime’s infrequent visits had shone like stars in his childhood, rare opportunities to be a child, a brother, a Lannister without censure or judgement.

Cersei and Tywin had always been so dismissive of his deformities, he can’t imagine how they will deal with Jaime being less than whole and perfect. For that matter, he wonders how Jaime will cope with it – he seemed to see past Tyrion’s limitations, but Jaime’s sense of self has always been so bound up in his own physicality that Tyrion can’t imagine that he’ll find it easy to see past the loss of so much that made him what he was. _But then_ , Tyrion thinks, _I’ve lost a Hand too and I managed to cope._

He’s always been more adaptable than Jaime though.

 He recalls a time when he was around five years old. Jaime had been home and demonstrating some of his newfound sword skills for his father and some of his bannermen. Tyrion had been watching, as was his wont, unobtrusively and he thought entirely unnoticed. He’d been entranced by the flashing sword and his brother’s easy grace, and lingered on long after everyone else had left.  

The training blades  were lying abandoned in a rack and Tyrion had grabbed hold of one, keen to emulate his older brother. The weight would have been tough for any small child to manage, even more so for Tyrion. He had stumbled forward and had the blades been sharpened he would probably have lost a foot that day. Undaunted, he had dragged the sword behind him, trying to figure out the trick of making the blade dance and sing.  

Concentrating fiercely, he hadn’t heard the footsteps straight away. He’d dropped the sword and whirled around, waiting for the mocking to begin. He had been relieved and not entirely surprised to see Jaime, even then he’d begun to realise that his brother noticed much more than most people realised, even if he pretended not to see things a lot of the time.

“So you want to learn to swing a sword, Imp?” Jaime had asked. When Jaime called him imp it had none of the sting and venom that Cersei filled it with.

Once Tyrion had cautiously nodded his head in acknowledgement, Jaime gently walked over and guided his hands into the correct position on the hilt. Cersei would have attacked him with sharp words or pinches for expressing such a desire, his father would have ignored him or dismissed him with a disparaging sigh, but Jaime was content to teach him.

It had proved a hopeless task, of course, Jaime had moved through progressively smaller swords but Tyrion’s feet and hands were clumsy and had refused to obey even the simplest of commands. Finally Jaime had fetched a dagger and was working on teaching him a few simple thrusts, when Cersei had appeared from nowhere, hair streaming behind her and a training blade in hand, demanding to prove that she could fight “as well as any man, and five times better than that pathetic  Imp.”

After that Jaime had been lost to him, he’d merely offered an apologetic smile and started to parry Cersei’s strokes.

It wasn’t long after that before Tyrion realised that his attentions would be far better served sharpening his tongue and his wit and leaving the blades to other men, but Tyrion’s never forgotten that moment though, the simple kindness and the… _normality_ of it all. The way his brother treated him as an equal.

This is the Jaime that Tyrion longs for, in his loneliness, the one he pictures before him. He knows that given the chance, he could get through to him, win him over. He tries desperately to hold onto this picture in his mind, not to let it twist away from him by letting his thoughts wander back down the familiar paths of pain and mistrust. Down in the darkness and with nothing to draw from but his own counsel, Tyrion knows it was his father who set all three of them on these twisted roads. _A debt that must be paid,_ he decides, wondering if he will ever get to see some restitution. Perhaps it’s not Tywin’s fault, after losing his wife, but Tyrion knows that it certainly isn’t _his_ fault, and the debt must stand.

The door opens, and it takes some time for Tyrion to realise that the worn face that appears before him is real.


End file.
